Thursday, April 25, 2013

3-Month Update

As many of you know we found out that Kay's ovarian cancer seemed to be recurring at her follow up visits after finishing her surgery-chemo-radiation therapy regimen last year, and she had her 3-month follow up visit with Dr. McCroskey last Thursday.  The news is decidedly mixed.  The good news is that Kay continues to feel well and life is good.  Some of her local friends threw her a party for her 59th birthday and they went to a ceramics painting place and painted a set of marine-theme plates.  We also had a family party in Seattle and she had a sleep-over with Jean and Brett at Jean's place. The medical news is just OK.  Her tumor marker, the CA-125 continues to rise, from 30 about 3 months ago, to 72 now.  This unfortunately confirms that her cancer is growing, but not terribly rapidly.  She is going to get a CT scan soon to look for any measurable bulk of tumor, but the plan for now is to carry on, live our lives and recheck the tests in 3 months again.  This will give her another period of time without chemo and the attendent side-effects.
At that time there is a good chance she will need to go on treatment to keep the cancer from spreading, and there are some not-too-intolerably-difficult options.  Most likely is seeing if an oral PARP inhibitor prevents works.  Other options may include a tumor-immunization trial being done at the University of Pennsylvania. We will learn more about the options as the time for treatment approaches.  For now it's time to live as normally as possible and cherish time off treatment.
This is all pretty much in the mid-range of our expectations, not great news, but not a big setback either.  We are committed to living fully and normally

Happy Valentines Day

Happy Valentine's Day!

Kay and I want to shout out to all Happy Valentine's Day.  We love each other and want to sent some love out to all of our friends and family too.

This year is off to a pretty good start for the the Washington Pullen family, and if this sounds like a Christmas letter that's because we didn't get a Christmas letter done.  For details on Kay's cancer see the post immediately prior to this.  That's the last I'll mention of cancer in this post.

Kay and I have been busy having fun for the last few months.  We had a great 2+ week vacation in Cabos prior to Christmas, half with friends the half with Jean, Brett and Keith Colmar, Kay's brother.  This was a really nice trip, and as usual the sun, water and Mexican environment were much enjoyed.  Both kids were home for Christmas and that was low key and enjoyable.

For the first half of 2013 we have fun planned with a fair amount of birding adventures coming up soon and a possible big trip if we figure out the details.  Maybe Paris.  Kay is getting more active in her painting getting together with an old friend Stephanie regularly for inspiration and creative exchange.  She has wound Pullen Advertising down to functional retirement, and that is great too.

I am embarking on a new stage of my career at Sound Family Medicine.  I've recruited two very good young physician assistants to work closely with me to care for our patients.  The expectation is that this will allow me to stay in practice longer, take more time for travel and enjoyment, and still have my patients get strong continuity care.  I'm excited about this and so far, in the very early stages, it seems to be going well.
Jean continues at Blue Nile, the online diamond and jewelry retailer based in Seattle as a senior accountant, and if finding the company a good place to work and balance work-home life.  Life in Seattle has been great for her and she gets home regularly as well as our frequent trips to the city where we often meet up with her and Ryan, her boyfriend.

Brett continues his career in internet business development and management. He is working really hard, making progress and we are proud and supportive parents of our entropreneur son.  It is amazing how many young adults we know now whose careers are focused on internet marketing, managmenet and related fields.  Brett is going to do great in this field as he is focused and determined.